Lessons Learned from the Deepwater Horizon Response

摘要

Following the unprecedented federal response to the Deepwater Horizon (DWH) disaster, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) conducted a review of the Institute's response activities. The purpose of this report is to evaluate those response activities, and in light of knowledge gained, identify ways to improve our response in the future. This report is organized by first providing information on NIOSH response activities, followed by several sections containing lessons-learned information, and ending in a discussion about next steps. Occupational safety and health experts from NIOSH arrived on site in response to the oil spill on May 3, 2010, at the invitation of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), as part of the federal interagency effort to anticipate and address the occupational safety and health needs of containment and cleanup response workers on the Gulf Coast. The unprecedented circumstances and magnitude of the disaster posed numerous challenges for NIOSH. NIOSH staff deployed to multiple locations in the five-state Gulf region; coordinated cross-agency and interagency operations in Atlanta, GA, and Washington, DC; supported other agencies' missions as subject matter experts; and provided technical and administrative support from NIOSH divisions, labs, and offices located throughout the country. This effort was a large activation of NIOSH personnel, cumulatively resulting in deployment of 106 staff into the field and involving close to 250 staff in total.